Core clinical clerkships take place typically within the students’ clerkship site at hospitals, private offices, and clinics where RVUCOM has formal affiliation agreements. Students are assigned to supervising preceptors for each clerkship. Supervising preceptors are credentialed adjunct faculty of Rocky Vista University. The Department of Clinical Education receives credentialing information from prospective physicians, reviews this information and, if appropriate, will grant the physician’s request to be a preceptor for the university at an academic ranking established in accordance with established RVU policy. Credentialed faculty of a residency program that provides students with OMS III Core Clerkships will also be credentialed as Adjunct Faculty of RVU.
The Department of Clinical Education communicates with each clerkship supervising preceptor and core site director about the students who will rotate with a supervising preceptor and the dates that each student will be at that preceptor’s site. This communication includes student and clerkship-specific information for the Preceptor and his/her staff, including expectations of student-patient care interaction and preceptor assessment of student performance in such encounters. Preceptors are expected to provide students with formative feedback regularly during the core clinical clerkship, with a summative evaluation given to the student in writing at the conclusion of the clerkship.
While on core clinical clerkships, students participate in discipline-specific didactics facilitated by the Clerkship’s RVU Clerkship Faculty Director. Such didactics occur weekly and are designed to focus student learning on board-relevant topics, augment clinical preceptor-guided learning, and task students to practice oral presentation skills.